August 9, 2013
Thessaloniki
If I wanted to bet on a sure thing, I’d bet none of you has ever had an email—or a letter—from Thessaloniki, Greece’s second largest city, at 1 million people.
That’s too bad, because the city has a lot to offer that’s different than what you see in Athens. For one thing (unlike Athens), it is a port city; we’re a half block from the Thermatic Gulf, and biking here in the morning on the seafront promenade is different than biking the constitution trail, as you might imagine.
Here’re four reasons you might consider including Thessaloniki on your itinerary the next time you are in this part of the world:
First, it’s now the biggest city in Macedonia (not the country that broke away from Yugoslavia and is still causing the Greeks nightmares—Greece has contested the right of the other Macedonia to use the name Macedonia); that’s maybe not a big deal today, but if you remember your history of the world, Alexander the Great was a Macedonian who in the fourth century spread Greek civilization to the Indus and much of the known world—dying at the age of 33. Today, Carolyn and I went to two nearby sites which were associated with that Macedonian dynasty that first united the Greeks (under his father, Philip II), and then, under Alexander, dominated Eurasia. Archeologists found the tomb of Philip, with its wonderful gold wreaths and other items, and created a museum over the tomb (which included one of his seven wives) that has the items. We also went to the nearby Pella museum, more recently excavated—it opened last year with EU money—which has some wonderful floor mosaics. Pella was the capital of Macedonia at a time when it was on the Gulf; erosion moved the Gulf nearly forty miles away, which led to the foundation of Thessalonica, named for the wife of King Cassander, who was one of Alexander’s daughters. The local Archeological museum stresses the history of Macedonia, with its own collection of gold jewelry—with nary a reference to those upstarts down south (Athens).
Thessalonica, and the rest of Macedonia, came under Roman rule around 140 BC, and for the next 1400 years was mostly Roman or Byzantine. The heyday of the city was probably around 300 AD, when Diocletian’s fellow coruler, Galerius, made Thessalonika his capital. There’s an Arch of Triumph he built, the remains of a palace, and a rotunda that has (like so many of the churches) also seen use as a mosque. Impressive as well are the walls that Theodosius, who encircled Constantinople with the walls that held the city safe for most of its history, built in the 4th century BC. After all, Thessaloniki was a major port on the Via Egnatia, the main route between the old and new Rome. The extant older churches, some going back to the 6th century, including a copy of Hagia Sophia (called Hagia Sophia), have icons and mosaics and frescoes that are dazzling. There is a stunning Byzantine museum that has mostly local art, with nary a mention of the New Rome (Constantinople).
Captured several times by the Turks, it finally came under Ottoman rule in 1430, and while the Turkish population left in 1912 (after the first Balkan War, when Thessaloniki became part of Greece) or 1923, when over 90,000 Greeks from Asia Minor were “exchanged” for Turks in Greece after Turkish armies defeated the Greek/Allied forces that tried to partition Turkey, there are still some Turkish influences remaining. The White Tower, one of the brand identifiers, joining the coast with the city wall, and at various times a prison, was built by either the Turks or the Venetians; a fortress at the top of the highest hill (the Acropolis) also became a Turkish prison that the Greek government also used for political prisoners until 1974, when the Greek dictatorship fell. One famous Turk—Mustafa Kemal, better known as Ataturk, the man who created modern Turkey, was born here. We went to his birthplace, which is part of the Turkish consulate, but the promised museum is still abuilding.
Finally, as a consequence of the Turkish conquest, the city welcomed a large number of Sephardic Jews, from Spain. I remember that Bayazit II (I think that was the Sultan) listed among his achievements in his tomb, sending ships to take the Jews from inquisition-driven Spain to the Ottoman lands. Thessaloniki was one of the main destinations, partly because, as our guide noted, the Turks wanted several minority groups to balance the Christians (Paul preached here in 50 AD—we went to the monastery that is now on the site—and some say the first Christian community was in Thessalonica). The Jerusalem of the Balkans (as it was known) lasted until Nazi occupation; in 1943, 50,000 Jews from the city were sent to concentration camps. 96.5 percent never made it back.
Unfortunately for the historians, though, most of the old city was burned in 1917, and the planning for a new city—or the preservation of the heritage—has not been entirely successful. The Roman Agora (the marketplace) got uncovered when the city tried to build a courthouse; the courthouse did get built elsewhere, but preservation in Greece in general, and in Thessaloniki in particular, has been a struggle. It’s interesting to note that the EU, which has been taking Greece to task for its economic weaknesses, has been funding a lot of the excavations. It’s just that there’s so much here!